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Reports that users are unable to sync their iPhones on Windows 7 computers that use motherboards with Intel's P55 Express southbridge emerged six weeks ago. Now, a story in The Register indicates that Intel and Microsoft are looking into the problem, but Apple remains silent.

Users have reported that when they try to sync using iTunes 9 for Windows on PCs equipped with the P55 "chipset" (actually an integrated controller hub on a single chip), they get the above “error 0xE8000065″ message, which The Register identifies as an “iPhone-connection failure notification.” The problem occurs consistently with iPhones directly connected to onboard USB ports or connected hubs, though some users have reported success connecting to USB ports on PCI cards. However, other users have reported "blue-screen" crashes when attempting to use expansion cards.

The issue seems to be generally with Windows 7 systems, but there have been sporadic reports of computers with the P55 controller running 64-bit Vista also failing to sync. The problem has been reported on motherboards manufactured by Micro-Star International (MSI), Gigabyte, and Asustek.

Microsoft was contacted by The Register for its story, and provided the following statement:

Microsoft has not seen this particular question posed in the Microsoft Answers for Windows 7 community forum, nor in any of our call centers. We reviewed the issue raised on the Apple Discussion Board and are currently investigating. If we determine this to be a problem specific to Windows 7, we will post an update on the Microsoft Answers site.

Apple has not responded to the issue raised on its own discussion board, though one ModMyi user was able to resolve the problem by enabling C-state mode in BIOS as a poster on the Support forums suggested. Other workarounds include disabling Bonjour or deleting the iPodDevices.xml file.

The kicker: 27-inch iMac models sporting Intel's Core i5 processors are expected later this month, with Core i7 iMacs to follow in January - and those computers may very well be using P55 Express. So chances are Apple is on this, just in their typical non-communicative manner.